St. Maarten implements automated border control with eGates

Princess Juliana International Airport SXM and the Police Force of Sint Maarten (KPSM) have successfully implemented an automated border control (ABC) clearance e-Gates solution at the Immigration zone of the Airport. The system was installed early this year.

In fulfillment of the organisations’public/private partnership, the introduction of e-Gates is just one of many initiatives to be implemented that are geared towards improving the traveler experience and enhancing passenger processing and security at the Airport. “Our main goal is to introduce an integrated passenger experience programme that seamlessly streamlines the identification, verification, validation and enrollment processes in such a way that it positively enhances passenger flow, while maintaining the highest level of security for travellers,” said Police Chief Commissioner Carl John. This joint initiative by KPSM and the Airport marks a strong commitment to the modernisation of Immigration’s border control processes at the Airport through the use of innovation and technology.

The latest generation e-Gates, which are integrated with the Airport’s common-use infrastructure, offer a very fast exit emigration control procedure, taking only
a few seconds to complete each transaction. With assistance from the Airport’s newly appointed ambassadors, who guide and assist eligible travellers in the use of the solution, the system can then validate the authenticity of their electronic travel documents and allow those travellers to enter the e-Gate to perform biometric matching and enrolment.

At every step of Immigration clearance, this process is monitored by an Immigration officer who oversees all e-Gates a traveller encounters from an inspector’s
booth. The e-Gates are designed to address the need for greater efficiency and growing demands for high traveller throughput, while the solution further empowers
Immigration officers in being able to process upwards of six travellers in the same timeframe it would customarily take one passenger to be cleared through exit control. On successful completion of a transaction, the traveller may then proceed to Airport security screening and continue on his or her journey.

This is only the beginning of the Airport’s and KPSM’s collective vision in realising a self-service revolution to modernise the passenger experience across the entire airport, covering both arrivals and future plans at the fixedbase operator (FBO) programme. “The aim is to professionalise the Immigration clearance process at our borders to a global standard, whereby solutions such as advanced passenger information systems, passenger name record systems and biometric verification can
be utilised to equip our service in combating crossborder crimes and potential threats to our national security,” explained Police Commissioner Denise Jacobs, current head of Immigration Enforcement and Border Control. KPSM is working closely with Kingdom partners in shaping its ability to perform advanced passenger analysis, which once in place will be a useful tool in filtering high-risk travellers from those who are considered low-risk. Together these solutions will work in symphony with ABC systems to alert and improve response times for officers in their decision-making.

With the security checkpoint BCBP e-Gates already in use at the Airport, eligibility control from landside to airside has been tremendously expedited. These latest generations of automated border control e-Gates will continue to enhance the next step of the passengers’ journey by not only allowing electronic travel documents to be validated on encounter, but also allowing all machinereadable travel documents to be accepted by the solution.

The Daily Herald